80 APPLE GROWING IN CALIFORNIA. 



The natural mortality due to weather conditions during the winter 

 time is sometimes great, but varies from season to season. The numbers 

 that survive until spring to develop into moths have an important bear- 

 ing on the ease or difficulty with which this insect may be controlled. 

 If a winter season is such that seventy-five per cent of the worms which 

 began hibernation in the fall transform, the females to lay eggs in the 

 spring, it would be expected that a much more serious condition would 

 result, providing no spraying were done, than if only ten per cent had 

 lived through. As the number of larvae that are present in the spring 

 will determine largely the number of applications of spray that are 

 necessary, and as a superabundance may mean the loss of a great many 

 apples, no matter how carefully the work of spraying is done, too much 

 attention cannot be paid to destroying the larvae during the winter 

 season, beneath bands put on trees as traps in the summer, and -in every 

 way possible to reduce their numbers to the minimum. 



The Pupal Stage. 



When the warm weather of spring comes on the larvae which have 

 survived the winter begin to pupate, and in the cocoons may be found 

 little brown, footless, quiescent creatures, not able to move about, and 

 .aside from a slight movement of the portion corresponding to the abdo- 

 men of the adult which will soon emerge, they are immobile. This stage 

 may last several weeks in the spring, but in the case of first brood 

 pupae it averages about two weeks. From this stage there develops the 

 mature winged moths, the females of which, after mating, begin egg 

 laying. 



The Moth Stage. 



No orchardist who grows apples can reasonably find any excuse for 

 not knowing the appearance of the codling moth, and yet there are those 

 who are apt to mistake almost any kind of a common cutworm moth for 

 this destructive species. A few mature larvae or pupae, collected and 

 put in a pasteboard box any time during the spring or summer season, 

 will develop into moths and the characteristic appearance may then be 

 noted. They are gray in color with distinct yellowish, almost gold 

 colored spots near the tips of fore wings and a wing expanse of not over 

 three fourths of an inch. The characteristic yellow markings make this 

 species readily distinguishable from practically all others, and yet we 

 find men who should know better, trapping moths by lights, mostly cut- 

 worm species, and claiming that they are destroying the codling moths. 



The Egg Stage. 



Contrary to the general opinion codling moth eggs are not hard to 

 find when one learns what they look like and where to look for them. 

 They are laid singly on the foliage or fruit, and rarely on the twigs. If 

 found on the former, in practically every case they will be found on the 

 upper or smooth surface of a leaf and almost always close to an apple 

 or cluster of apples. The moths seem to possess an instinct which 

 prompts them to lay these eggs where the little worms, upon hatching 

 from them, will have little trouble in locating some of their food the 

 fruit, In shape the eggs are almost circular and very flat, adhering 

 closely to the surface of a leaf, or apple. The diameter is about that 

 of the head of an ordinary pin. On the surface there is more or less 



